


la petite mort

by lifefindsaway



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Canon Era, Character Death, M/M, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-05
Updated: 2016-06-05
Packaged: 2018-07-12 11:29:07
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,057
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7101382
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lifefindsaway/pseuds/lifefindsaway
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Grantaire falls in love with an angel of death.</p>
            </blockquote>





	la petite mort

**Author's Note:**

> Happy June 5th! What better way to celebrate than with a barricades fic?
> 
> I'd like to thank my highly talented artist, [Kaja](http://kajainthesky.tumblr.com/), for the beautiful works she made for my fic and my beta, [Ece](http://nakedbrownie.tumblr.com/), who caught my mistakes and is generally the best of betas and people! Also, I want to acknowledge [Pia](http://mariuspondmercy.tumblr.com/) because it was talking with her that gave me the idea for this fic ♥
> 
> Major character death has been included in the tags and I've warned for graphic violence. This isn't exactly a happy story--but I hope you'll give it a try anyway!

Grantaire leaned against the rain-slicked brick, his skin flushed and overheated from exertion and an excess of alcohol despite the chill in the damp air. His eyes slid shut as he sagged bodily against the wall, nearly toppling over before before finding his balance. He stood there some time, alternately counting his uneven breaths and tugging at his tangled hair. Then he struggled to his feet and stared despondently ahead. 

“I am quite drunk,” he announced morosely, “and you, monsieur, are quite dead. My God.” 

The man in question lay before Grantaire in an ungainly sprawl, one arm trapped beneath his body, the other cast carelessly to one side. His head was turned so that Grantaire was spared the final accusation of that sightless gaze. It didn’t improve matters much. 

“I am not drunk enough,” he said and sighed wearily. He hadn’t enough money nor enough charm left to find more drink. He would have to retire to his room. 

He would have to navigate around the dead body first, a daunting task, given the man’s impressively large frame—he stretched the width of the narrow alley, blocking the path in such a way that Grantaire was obliged to scale his bulk in order to escape onto the street. All of this was further complicated by the wine Grantaire had earlier drunk; he slipped several times, no doubt leaving further bruises on the body. 

The whole affair took some five minutes and left Grantaire sitting on the ground scarcely two paces from the body, examining several new cuts and bruises of his own. A small price to pay for his liberty, he thought grimly. What was it those students liked to say?  

“Ah, yes.  _Liberté ou la mort_. Charming,” Grantaire said to the body, clapping it on the shoulder with the sort of familiarity reserved primarily for drinking partners and close friends. “And now here we are: Liberty and death. What a picture we make.” Something warm trickled down his forehead, into his eye. Grantaire absently wiped at it with the back of his sleeve—blood. “I must bid you adieu, monsieur. It seems I have sprung a leak. It is your fault, of course, but I think it must be in bad taste to blame a dead man.” 

He got to his feet, fixed his gaze on the body once more, pensive. 

“Rest in peace, my friend.” 

Grantaire executed a sloppy turn, vision blurring and refocusing on the speaker unexpectedly and very immediately to his right. He stumbled back a few steps, startled. It was a young man, both taller and slighter than Grantaire, with soft, shimmering golden hair framing a pale, delicate, downturned face. Long lashes rested against smooth cheeks and a well-formed mouth silently recited what Grantaire had to guess was a prayer. 

Perhaps the most surprising, though, was how utterly unremarkable the young man actually was: despite the striking good looks, he was dressed similarly to Grantaire himself, albeit in a more sharply tailored coat and a better-fitting waistcoat, and cut a fine figure, cast half in shadow under the light from a nearby street lamp. 

“Gabriel!” Grantaire cried. “I had no thoughts for revolutions—apologies, no. I misspeak. No thoughts for  _revelations_ , rather, and yet here you stand before me.” 

The youth turned then to look at Grantaire, and Grantaire was momentarily lost in thought as he tried to determine the exact shade of blue of those eyes. “I’m not an angel.” The voice, too, was lovely—melodic, despite the sharp edge. “Well,” he amended, “that is to say, I am, but… I have never much liked being called an angel of death. It is so grim.” 

Grantaire blinked. 

“Away with you,” the youth said, turning his attention back to the unfortunate body still sprawled on the ground before them. He knelt beside it, resting a slender hand on the corpse’s forehead. “Get yourself to bed lest I am obliged to visit you in a ditch.” 

It was a clear dismissal that Grantaire chose to willfully ignore. “From the earth I have come and to the earth I am destined to return,” he said serenely. “Bedding there on occasion does no harm and may, in fact, do some good: I must be a great deal more prepared for the final rest than most.” 

This caused the youth to look up, his mouth twisted into a lovely little scowl. How easy it would be to trace those lips onto canvas with a soft brush. With pink, maybe, or—Grantaire made a soft, thoughtful noise. Red. A vibrant, shocking red. 

“You shouldn’t say such things,” the youth said reprovingly. He sat back on his heels, a gesture so disarmingly normal that Grantaire was reminded all at once of his abnormality. Grantaire smiled, which served only as a further irritant; the scowl deepened. 

Paint was not the appropriate medium for such a subject. 

“No? Well, you would know better than I, angel.” Grantaire felt his pockets and withdrew a small notebook with a fragment of a pencil wedged into the pages. He shifted so that he might have better light, and set about sketching the scene. It was a poor representation: Grantaire’s pencil was dull, the page warped from being so often and carelessly carried about in his coat. And this did not take into consideration Grantaire’s skill, which was generally found to be wanting.  

He persisted. 

“What are you doing?” The youth rose, moving with an enviable grace to stand by Grantaire’s side, peering over his shoulder at Grantaire’s work. He made a sound of surprise, then seemed to remember himself. “You must go,” he told Grantaire again. “I cannot perform my duties if you insist on staying, and you need to distance yourself from this place.” 

“From you?” Grantaire guessed. He bit his lip and absently shoved his pencil back into the pages of his little notebook, tucking back into one of the pockets on his coat. He toyed with one corner of the book as he thought. “Oh, of course. A ditch is uncomfortable, but prison is—” 

“Go,” the youth said again. 

This time, Grantaire obediently trundled off, his uneven steps muted against the rain-soaked street. His shoes were soaked through as he made no effort to avoid even the larger puddles of water. No matter. He could dry them later. He touched the pocket of his coat, felt the edges of his notebook through the layers of fabric, and stumbled down one street and then another and another until he was—and quite suddenly, it seemed; he couldn’t recall with any clarity the journey—in his room. 

Despite his best intentions, Grantaire fell onto his bed. He was fast asleep before his head touched his pillow. 

 

 

 

***

 

Though Grantaire thought often of the encounter in the weeks following, he spoke of it to no one. For one, the dead man’s body had been discovered by a gamin the morning after and the police were still interested in finding the culprit. Primarily, however, Grantaire was certain that no one would believe him even if he  _were_  to share the story of his angel.  

Prouvaire had, one evening, happened to see the sketch in Grantaire’s notebook as he sought out a fresh page to scrawl down several verses he had spontaneously composed and was eager for Grantaire to remember. 

“Who is this?” he’d asked, tracing the air just above the sloppily shaded sketch. 

Grantaire had shrugged and busied himself with his wine. He didn’t know how to explain the strangeness of that night. (Were it not for the drawing, he would’ve thought it a dream.) He wasn’t particularly inclined to try. 

Prouvaire, to his credit, had not pressed the matter. 

And so now Grantaire was content to go about his business, devoting time, now and then, to wonder what his angel might be doing and whether he might be fortunate enough to cross paths with him again. He had a feeling that it would not be so easy as it had been the first time—though, he reflected, it had not been so easy the first time. He still bore the faintest greenish marks, souvenirs of that evening. Would he have to draw blood to earn a second meeting? 

Grantaire tugged at his cravat. It had started to creep out of its knot and off his neck. He fastidiously retied it, tucked it back into place. Homely though he may be, he could at least take care with his clothes. 

It was at this moment that Bossuet found him. His forehead was beaded with perspiration and he stood in the doorway for a long moment, much to the consternation of the people trying to make use of the door. Grantaire took pity on him and waved until Bossuet spotted him and came to join him. 

“How do you do that?” Bossuet asked. He sat very near Grantaire and even took up Grantaire’s cup, lifting it so that he could sniff at the contents before deciding the coffee agreeable enough and claiming the cup for his own. Grantaire generously did not complain and even offered Bossuet his handkerchief. Bossuet dabbed at his forehead. 

“Do what?” Grantaire asked. 

“Disappear so completely. I’ve looked everywhere for you, you know. I tried your room first, but no one had seen you returning or leaving in several days and I was gently persuaded to cease abusing your door. I then thought to try some of your favorite haunts but, alas, there was no Grantaire to be found.” Bossuet pointed at him accusingly. “Had I known I would find you here, then I should have saved myself a great deal of trouble.” 

“I thought your friends were to meet here this afternoon,” Grantaire confessed. “As I had nowhere else to be, I thought I would wait a little while for them. It has not been so bad; Mme. Hucheloup has both the best coffee and the worst food for several blocks in either direction. I've treated myself." 

“ _Our_  friends,” Bossuet corrected, “have agreed to come around tomorrow. I heard from Bahorel that Courfeyrac has his hands full with a new protégé.” 

Grantaire nodded solemnly. They sat quietly and contemplated this; were Grantaire more superstitious, he might’ve prayed for the poor soul at Courfeyrac’s mercy. Instead, he idly drew a pattern on the table top with one finger. Bossuet folded up Grantaire’s handkerchief and tucked it into a pocket. 

“At any rate, there was a reason I was looking for you and you haven’t had the decency to ask,” Bossuet said at length. 

“Was it not to commiserate over Courfeyrac’s new project?” 

“It was to invite you to dinner. Musichetta has a new gown and Joly and I are determined to celebrate it.” Bossuet grinned. “Once you see it, you’ll understand.” He finished Grantaire’s coffee and sat back in his chair, folding his arms over his stomach. “We’re going to go somewhere nice, the four of us, and there will be drinking and dancing and much admiring of Musichetta’s dress. How does that sound?” 

“Delightful,” Grantaire replied. 

“Excellent,” Bossuet said.  

Grantaire flagged down Louison and ordered another pot of coffee. He'd already gone through one on his own, save the cup Bossuet had appropriated, and Louison knew it. She obligingly went off to fetch the coffee, but not without a lot of tutting and muttering under her breath first. This amused Bossuet and led to a spirited discussion of Grantaire's bad habits.  

"I thought you were my friend. I'm certain that a true friend would not abuse me like this. I will not stand for it." 

Bossuet laughed. "Well, you do not have stand it any longer. I must go prepare for our evening out. I cannot allow Joly to make a better showing." He rose, adjusting his coat, and added, "I'll see you in a few hours, then. We shall set off as soon as you arrive." 

"L’aigle, take care with your feathers," Grantaire said. "I'll not keep you waiting." He waved Bossuet off and lingered long enough to flirt with Louison a little longer, then left himself to go prepare for his evening out. He washed his face, humming as he did, and undressed. He had one coat that was a little nicer than the one that he preferred for everyday wear, which he changed into, and a hat, which he donned after making a valiant attempt to tame his hair into something approaching respectable.

Grantaire was in a good mood. He’d spent the morning sleeping and lazily sketching and smoking, and then the afternoon with his friend. There was little that could improve his day, save an evening with three of the very few people whose companionship he actively sought and enjoyed.

He left his room, tilting his hat to what he considered a fashionable angle, and turned down a side street that conveniently cut ten minutes off of his trip to Joly and Bossuet’s corner of the city.

As he passed beneath a window, there was a shout and a crash and faint sobs. Grantaire idled beneath the window. It was no business of his and he had no right to intrude upon the personal lives of others, but—the sobs grew louder—he felt compelled to see what all the fuss was about.

“Damn it,” he murmured, and he doubled back to the front of the building, taking the stairs two at a time as he rushed up.

A door stood ajar, the shattered remains of a plate in the doorway, food spilled across the floor. Grantaire gingerly pushed the door open; a man knelt in the floor, his body wracked with great, heaving sobs. A woman’s body lay next to him, and Grantaire might have mistaken her repose for sleep if not for several things: her unnatural position, the stillness of her chest, and the growing pool of blood that spread about her like an angel’s wings.

“I didn’t mean to,” the man said through his tears. “Please, wake up, get up.”

Grantaire noticed he held a knife in his hand. He quietly backed out of the room—and into someone. He startled badly enough that his hat tumbled off of his head. He made no attempt to pick it up.

“These meetings will not become a habit.”

It was Grantaire’s angel. He was wearing red tonight, as though he had perceived Grantaire’s thoughts and dressed to please him, and that same little scowl. It was softer this time, though. Maybe he could see how rattled Grantaire felt.

“I hope they do,” Grantaire said earnestly. “I didn’t get your name before.”

“You never asked.”

Grantaire had to concede the point, and did.

“If I tell you, will you leave?” He stooped and picked up Grantaire’s hat, gently brushing it off. There was still something very severe about his expression, but he did not seem annoyed so much as pensive. He turned Grantaire’s hat about in his hands, running a finger thoughtfully along the fabric.

“Yes,” Grantaire said. “I can promise you that. Give me your name and I will give you your privacy. Is that not a fair trade? Here, I will give you your privacy _and_ my name—it is Grantaire.”

“I’m Enjolras,” he said. He held out Grantaire’s hat, which Grantaire accepted, and glanced at the staircase.

“Enjolras,” Grantaire repeated. He shoved his hat back on his head and turned to leave as promised. “It is not so pleasant in there,” he said. “Though I suppose you already know that, don’t you?”

“Go,” Enjolras said.

“Until next time, then.” Grantaire gave Enjolras a little bow and only a little reluctantly resumed his walk to Joly and Bossuet’s.

He considered Enjolras as he walked.

“Once is chance, and twice might be a coincidence,” he reasoned. A stray cat flicked its tail at him, but he paid it no heed. “But three times—ah! If this happens again…no. _When_ it happens again; I should like to see him again.”

Musichetta met him in the street. Her dress was as fine as Bossuet had intimated and at Grantaire’s request she did a little twirl, her skirt flaring prettily around her ankles.

“But why are you muttering to yourself?” she asked, once she recovered her balance, a hand on Grantaire’s arm to keep from toppling over. “Are you well? If it so happens that you aren’t, please, do me the courtesy of pretending you are, or I fear Joly shall cancel our evening in order to send you to bed.”

“I won’t ruin your evening,” Grantaire said amiably. He patted Musichetta’s hand. “I was promised good wine and good food and, even better, good company. I wouldn’t miss that should I be upon my deathbed.”

Presently, Joly and Bossuet descended and joined them in the street, Joly exclaiming loudly over Musichetta’s dress and Bossuet pretending to scold Grantaire for attempting to steal away his mistress. They linked arms and marched down the street.

 

 

***

 

Inside the back room of the café Musain, Prouvaire sat down beside Grantaire and perused the messy scrawl of his handwriting as it crept across the open pages of his notebook before him. Grantaire was not in the habit of writing his thoughts down, but after learning Enjolras’s name, he had begun an earnest study of the etymology of that moniker. He wasn’t entirely sure what he hoped to accomplish, but that had not yet stopped him.

“You have misspelled this word,” Prouvaire said, tapping the page. “It is meant to be _enjôleras_ , I think. Though, it is not the word I would have chosen.” He murmured to himself, reading some of Grantaire’s notes aloud, and frowned. “You write prose now?”

“Poorly, as I do everything,” Grantaire replied, rather than correcting Prouvaire’s notion and explaining his true purpose. “Let us pray it never sees print.”

“You are a terrible critic. It isn’t so bad, you know. It far surpasses a lot of what I have been subjected to at the university.” Prouvaire gestured for the pencil, which Grantaire passed over without hesitation, and made a few notes in the margin. His handwriting was far more elegant—an art form. “What inspired you?”

Grantaire shrugged, though Prouvaire wasn’t looking up and so didn’t see.

“You’re keeping secrets,” Prouvaire said in a wounded voice.

“My dear, I am not; I would do no such thing,” Grantaire lied, though the sentiment was, in fact, very true. Prouvaire was a gentle soul and had always been kind to Grantaire, especially in those moments that Grantaire did not feel like showing himself kindness. It was intolerable, lying to Prouvaire, and so he decided to tell him as much as he could without sounding mad, or incriminating himself in either of the two deaths he had witnessed. “The truth is simple: I was out one evening and I—well. I found myself in an alley with a dead man.”

“My God! Did you—?”

Grantaire shook his head. “If I did, I have no recollection of the act, only the aftermath. But… that is beside the point. As you well know, dear poet, from the horror of death may spring a peculiar sort of beauty and so you see before you my attempts to create something lovely from the horror I experienced.”

Prouvaire regarded Grantaire’s notes again. “There’s no denying this is lovely. I’m just sorry you were in that position.”

“I kept to my room a few days and rested, thereby avoiding the police,” Grantaire said. “It was not all so bad. Combeferre came by one day to see why I had not attended his meeting, and he brought me some little pastries. So, really, I only profited from that misadventure.”

Grantaire was certain Prouvaire had more to say on the subject, but then Combeferre arrived, along with Courfeyrac and— _yes_ , Grantaire thought grimly, _that must be Courfeyrac’s new roommate; he has that harried sort of look about him unique to those intimately acquainted with Courfeyrac_.

The meeting commenced.

Altogether, there were six of them: Grantaire, of course, and Prouvaire, and Bossuet (“Joly sends his regards, but cannot be parted from his textbooks at this juncture.”). Combeferre and Courfeyrac were their leaders, though they avidly disavowed the joint title. And then there was Courfeyrac’s new friend, whom he introduced as “Marius Pontmercy! He is lodging with me at the present and I hope you will all treat him kindly. He’s rather new to insurrectionism.”

“All that remains is to ensure that our friends—” Though they had never been interrupted during any of the various secret meetings they’d held in this room, Combeferre believed it best to be cautious in the prelude to the final struggle, lest they find themselves stopped before they had a chance to begin “—still stand with us. Courfeyrac has volunteered to see the polytechnic students as they will be out and about anyway. Bahorel has assured me that he and Feuilly will see to the Glaciere and the Estrapade. Prouvaire, would you mind visiting the lodge of the Rue de Grenelle-Saint-Honore?”

“Not at all,” Prouvaire said graciously.

“Joly has class tomorrow,” Bossuet said. “He can speak with the medical students. As for me, I will practice my rhetoric and spend the afternoon with the law licentiates.”

“Oh, take Marius with you,” Courfeyrac said. “He has studied the law.”

Marius, who had until that point remained silent, said, “I haven’t the vocabulary that you do for these things, but I would be happy to accompany you and lend my support.”

“Please, do!”

“Very well. That leaves Picpus, Cougourde, and the Barriere du Maine,” said Combeferre. “I can do two of the three, I shall need someone else to go to the Barriere du Maine. It is, perhaps, the most vital. As you may well recall, we found a fiery, enthusiastic group there, but it has been some time since we fed their flame. I fear that they will cool off if we do not carefully tend to them.”

Grantaire had never volunteered for any of Combeferre and Courfeyrac’s missions before, not because he didn’t wish to see his friends succeed, but because he had little interest in exerting himself for a cause he was fairly certain wouldn’t succeed.

Marius did not know this.

“Could not Grantaire go?” he asked.

“What?”

“Grantaire,” Marius repeated. “Could not Grantaire go to the Barriere du Maine? You have assigned tasks to all of us, save him.”

Combeferre waved a hand dismissively. “Grantaire does not participate in these things.”

“Grantaire could, and will. Here am I—send me.”

That startled a laugh from Courfeyrac and loud cheering from Bossuet and Prouvaire. They had both often exhorted Grantaire into lending his services to the Republic, and he often ignored them.

“Do you know anything of these men?” Combeferre asked.

Grantaire retrieved his notebook from Prouvaire. Now that he had set his mind upon this task, he was determined to see it through. And as he knew himself well enough to know his resolve would abandon him if he delayed, he had no other choice but to see to it immediately.

“Grantaire,” Combeferre said again, “do you know anything of these men?”

“I have seen them at Richefeu’s and played dominos with a few of them. I have lost money to even more of them. We are not strangers.” He stood, his chair scraping against the floor behind him.

“And what will you say?”

Grantaire stood a little straighter, tipped his head back, placed one hand on his breast, and said solemnly, “‘Men are born and remain free and equal in rights. Social distinctions can be founded only on the common good. The goal, therefore, of any political association is the conservation of the natural and imprescriptible rights of man, which are these: liberty, property, safety, and resistance against oppression.’”

Prouvaire clapped.

“Alright,” Combeferre said, mollified. “You shall go to the Barriere du Maine.”

Grantaire grinned, bowed to the room at large, and went home to find his scarlet waistcoat.

 

***

 

Richefeu’s was almost always extraordinarily busy.

When Grantaire arrived, there were already a dozen men or more sitting around the tables, drinking and smoking and laughing. Grantaire smoothed the lapels of his waistcoat and peered through the thick haze of smoke, picking his way carefully through the haphazardly placed chairs until he found one that he could claim for his own.

“My friends,” he said, glancing around the table at his new companions. One man offered him a cigarette, which he accepted, and another man offered him a light. Grantaire took a languid drag, holding the smoke until it started to burn, then slowly breathed out, the smoke curling up around his head like a halo. “We have missed you at the Musain.”

He rummaged in his pockets and produced enough money to buy a bottle of wine for the table. In return, he was allowed to join their game. Grantaire made a neat little pile of his grains of bran and settled in to play.

Time passed in a blur of wine and cigarettes and bawdy jokes interspersed with revolutionary rhetoric. The men were far more susceptible to Robespierre than Grantaire might have guessed. He supposed that was a good thing for the ABC. Combeferre and Courfeyrac would be pleased by his report.

“Double-six.”

“Fours.”

“The pig! I have no more.”

“You are dead. A two.”

Grantaire idly rolled a grain between his fingers; he had won a considerable amount more than he had been given, though it seemed he was to lose it all. _Easy come, easy go_ , he thought. So long as his mission was complete, then it didn’t matter if he won. His pride would suffer the blow.

“Ho! Look out, Henri!” a man cried from the other side of the room.

Grantaire turned in his chair in time to see a figure—Henri—get to their feet, knocking over the candles and a half-full bottle of wine on his table in the process. He spoke quickly in an angry shout, and Grantaire got the gist quickly: he felt that he’d been cheated at cards—and this was not the first time this offense had occurred.

As no one had made any attempt to intervene, Grantaire took it upon himself to go and put a hand on Henri’s shoulder.

“Some fresh air might do you good,” Grantaire suggested.

Henri shrugged Grantaire off. “Stepping outside with this _thief_ would suit me better,” he snapped, and he might have lunged across the table had Grantaire not caught him around the waist.

“I love a fight as much as the next man,” Grantaire said, irritation creeping into his voice, “but you risk a perfectly good bottle of wine and that is unacceptable.”

Henri elbowed Grantaire hard in the stomach and Grantaire grunted, surprised, and let him go. “Mind your own damn business, and leave me to mine,” he said, stalking away from Grantaire.

Such gratitude! Grantaire rolled his eyes and returned to his seat.

“Gentlemen, where were we?”

There was another shout, and this time when Grantaire twisted around, it was just in time to see that Henri had returned—and this time with a bottle in hand. He ducked his companions’ attempts to pin him, closing the distance between himself and the man. He swung the bottle heavily and down his opponent went. There was more shouting and several more men joined the fray, concealing Henri from view.

A scream. Shattering glass.

Grantaire watched Henri stumble to his feet, falling back against the table. He pressed his hands to his neck desperately, trying to stem the flow of blood there. He’d been gashed with broken glass, Grantaire realized.

“Get help,” he said to no one in particular.

“It is rather too late for that.”

Grantaire’s eyes widened. Enjolras stood beside his chair, studying the dominos still littering Grantaire’s table. His gaze lingered on Grantaire’s wine glass, his cigarette butts. He pursed his lips, clearly displeased.

“How do you know?” Grantaire asked. As he had already decided, three times constituted a pattern and there was clearly something here. It was possible that Enjolras had been nothing more than a passer-by that first evening, and that he’d had business in that apartment the evening of their second meeting. But for him to be here and at this moment—that was more than coincidence.

“Drinking is a terrible habit,” Enjolras said. “And smoking is worse.”

Enjolras looked especially vivid in the dark, smoky room of Richefeu’s. His hair was bright, glowing softly from the candlelight. The red of his coat was brighter even than Grantaire’s scarlet waistcoat, though, Grantaire flattered himself, not by much. He folded his arms across his chest and adopted a stern expression. Grantaire couldn’t help but feel that his posture made him look very young.

“You have a remarkable sense of direction,” Grantaire said. “I haven’t the faintest idea how you’ve managed to keep track of me so well.”

“It isn’t you I follow,” Enjolras admitted, confirming Grantaire’s suspicions. “You really should drink less, Grantaire.”

“Could it be, angel, that you care what happens to me?” Grantaire asked teasingly, and he was rewarded by the faintest coloring of Enjolras’s cheeks. “Ah! You do!” he said, delightedly, and the color became more pronounced.

Across the room, Henri labored for breath and men clamored around him, trying simultaneously to send for a doctor and to make the dying man as comfortable as possible.

“I have a job to do,” Enjolras protested. “It is an inconvenience, really, that I have begun seeing you with such regularity.”

“But there has been nothing _regular_ about our meetings.”

Enjolras’s mouth twisted into what Grantaire considered a very small smile. “In this profession, it is highly unusual for me to meet any one person more than once, and certainly not so often.”

“How might one go about finding you again, should they wish to see you?” Grantaire asked.

That little smile grew melancholic. “When the time comes, I will find you.”

Enjolras drifted away, walking with measured steps to Henri. Grantaire turned away, devoting his attention to what was left of his wine. When he turned around again, Henri was dead and Enjolras was nowhere to be seen.

 

***

 

“Leave it. There’s no saving it now.”

Feuilly and Grantaire exchanged a look and rounded the corner together, entering into the alley beside the Musain, and found a man forcibly tugging a woman away from a dirty bundle of rags. Upon closer inspection, the rags turned out to be a child—“A gamin,” Feuilly said gravely. “An orphan, no doubt.” He knelt beside the frail child, obscuring it from Grantaire’s view. “It lives, but… not for much longer, I should think. The weather has been too cold and too wet lately.”

“Here,” Grantaire said, “Let’s take it to my room and see about getting it warm. That will help matters significantly.”

Feuilly agreed and carefully lifted the child into his arms, murmuring soft, reassuring words as it made weak little noises of discomfort. It seemed content enough to nestle into the cradle of Feuilly’s arms, though. Every now and then, it was jostled despite Feuilly’s efforts to keep a steady stride, and whined as Feuilly shifted his hold, trying to put the child at ease. Grantaire hovered anxiously behind them, wishing to help but uncertain of how to go about doing that.

The relatively short walk to Grantaire’s seemed interminable. Each sigh pulled at Grantaire’s heart. He had long made a habit of convincing the gamins that ran up and down his street to stay with him on colder evenings—though that often cost Grantaire a few sous, as these fiercely independent children required payment before accepting assistance. Never had Grantaire encountered a child in such a poor state.

Grantaire let them into his room and gestured to the bed. Feuilly gently laid the child down and stepped back as Grantaire fussed with his blankets. The child was cold to the touch when Grantaire pressed a hand to its forehead, and it sleepily blinked at Grantaire, too tired to put up a fight.

“There,” Grantaire said, stepping back. “I will go down to the corner and see about buying fresh bread and maybe a broth of some kind. Unless you think that will be too rich…?”

“Grantaire, you realize—” Feuilly said haltingly. He shook his head, set about lighting a fire in Grantaire’s small grate. “We’ll be fine until you return.”

“Feuilly, you are an angel.”

Grantaire hurried back to the Musain, which was closer than any of the shops, and purchased bread, broth, and hot milk. It took him some time to make his way back, laden down by the food, but he took no more than a quarter of an hour, altogether.

Feuilly awaited him by the door.

“The milk might be too much,” Grantaire said, “but it struck me as a better choice than coffee. Why are you out here?”

Feuilly put his hands on Grantaire’s shoulders, comforting. “It did not suffer.”

“No.”

“I will see to the body. You need not concern yourself with it.”

When Grantaire failed to respond, or to move, Feuilly sighed. He had worked all day, Grantaire recalled, and then gone to the Musain to report in to Courfeyrac and Combeferre, and to check in with the other members of the ABC. He was sure to be exhausted, and yet here he was, assisting Grantaire.

“Thank you, but I can manage,” Grantaire said at length.

This time, it was Feuilly to say, “No.” He turned Grantaire about to face the stairs. “No, I will take care of this for you, my friend.”

“I must protest.”

“Then protest,” Feuilly said easily.

Grantaire thought of going into his room to find that child in his bed and was suddenly immensely grateful for Feuilly’s presence.

“Thank you,” he said quietly. “I—do believe I will pay Prouvaire a visit.”

“That is an excellent idea,” Feuilly agreed. After a pause, he pulled Grantaire in for a long embrace. “Don’t let this trouble you very much, please. You did what you could, which was a damn sight more than what others might do.”

That actually did make Grantaire feel a little better, though he still took his time in walking to Prouvaire’s. He didn’t even know the child’s name and yet Grantaire felt certain he wouldn’t forget him any time soon, if ever.

He wondered if Enjolras was there, comforting the child in Grantaire’s absence. And then the thought occurred to him: Would Feuilly see him? Selfishly, Grantaire hoped not. He wanted to keep Enjolras for himself for just a little longer.

“I was longing for company,” Prouvaire said when he came to his door. He ushered Grantaire in. “Fate has sent you to me. Ah, thank you very much.” He accepted the food from Grantaire and they sat together on Prouvaire’s bed, sharing the meal between them. Grantaire picked listlessly at his bread, all appetite gone.

“Death has sent me to you,” Grantaire said belatedly, and he told Prouvaire of the gamin.

“Oh, Grantaire.”

“I think, perhaps, that you can help me,” Grantaire cut in, unable and unwilling to discuss the gamin any further. “What do you know of Death?”

Prouvaire gave him a strange look.

“No, you misunderstand…” Grantaire swallowed thickly, turning his attention to the bread he was intently ripping apart. “I have no desire to end my life. I ask only because…”

“Because?” Prouvaire prompted when Grantaire fell silent.

“I have seen an angel.”

Grantaire produced his notebook and Prouvaire set his food aside so that he could take it. Instinctively, he opened it to the sketch of Enjolras, though, Grantaire supposed, it was perhaps not a difficult leap to make. Prouvaire studied the drawing with renewed interest, glancing between the page and Grantaire.

“I told you of the man I had the misfortune to come across in the alley some weeks ago,” Grantaire said. “What I didn’t say was that _I_ killed that man. Oh, it was not my intention, of course, but we had a disagreement over cards, and that turned into an altercation, and… before I knew exactly what was happening, we were outside and he was dead.”

“You were drunk.”

“Very much so,” Grantaire agreed. “When the full horror of the thing occurred to me, I thought to make my escape and then—I saw my angel. He…” Grantaire fell silent again, searching for the words to describe Enjolras. “Well, you see,” Grantaire nodded at the drawing in Prouvaire’s hand. “I have seen him twice more since, and always when there is some unpleasantness about. Death, I mean. And he did say as much, that he was involved.”

They were both quiet for a little while, Prouvaire digesting this information, perhaps, and Grantaire alternately thinking of Enjolras and worrying that he’d said too much.

At length, Prouvaire said, “I don’t know that I can help you, Grantaire. I confess, I’m not even sure what you seek to do.”

“I want to see him again.”

Prouvaire was quiet again.

“Not—not on a permanent basis, of course. I am too much a coward to give up this life, no matter how badly it suits me.”

“I think…” Prouvaire closed the notebook, running his fingers along the worn cover as he thought. “I think you know already what you must do, if that is truly what you desire.” He hesitated. “You say that he—”

“Enjolras.”

“Yes, Enjolras. You say that Enjolras has appeared to you when you have witnessed the final moments of these poor souls. Then does it not stand to reason that he will appear again should you bring about that end yourself?”

Grantaire gaped at Prouvaire, astounded.

“Do you truly suggest _murder_ , Jehan?”

Prouvaire shrugged.

“I’m not sure I have the stomach for it.”

“There is no reason to believe that the life must be human,” Prouvaire pointed out. “Maybe a cat would work just as well and there are quite a few that I would dearly love to rid myself of.”

Grantaire couldn’t fault Prouvaire’s logic, nor could he find any reason not to take what was left of the now-cooled milk he’d bought at the Musain and set it out in a small bowl provided by Prouvaire. They left it at the corner of his building and stood outside for a little while sharing a cigarette and talking vaguely of Enjolras.

A thin, starved cat took the bait. Prouvaire threw an old sheet over it. The cat struggled and hissed, but with Grantaire’s help, Prouvaire easily wrestled the cat into submission and got it into his room.

“You’re certain you want to do this?”

Prouvaire grunted as he fought to keep the cat pinned to the floor. He patiently waited until the cat had tired itself, then held it down with one hand and sat back on his heels to look up at Grantaire.

“Yes. If this works, I will meet this Enjolras. If not, I have one cat fewer with which to contend. Either outcome is desirable, though one is clearly more preferable.”

“I can do it,” Grantaire offered.

Prouvaire neatly snapped the cat’s neck by way of reply.

With bated breath, Grantaire eagerly looked about, waiting for Enjolras to step through the door or to in some way appear. Prouvaire folded up the sheet and set it aside, stroked the cat’s fur as they waited. It soon became clear that Enjolras was not going to come.

“It didn’t take this long before.”

“Well, that is one cat gone, then.”

Grantaire helped Prouvaire dispose of the cat outside.

 

***

 

The cat was the mistake, Grantaire thought, rolling onto his back. He stared at the ceiling above his bed. His blankets were gone, spirited away with the gamin. Feuilly, when he’d come by Prouvaire’s later that same night, had promised to bring him a new set. Grantaire had assured him that was unnecessary; he’d yet to get them himself. It was cold. 

The cat, though.

Grantaire had considered all that he knew of Enjolras and had arrived at the simplest of conclusions: death was not enough to compel Enjolras to appear. A soul must also be involved, he’d decided despite his own reservations about, which required the death of his fellow man. This was troubling to Grantaire’s gentler nature. Though—how hard could it be? He had managed to take a life well enough before, and he’d been exceptionally drunk.

Regrettable that someone should have to die in order for Grantaire to be blessed again with Enjolras’s presence, but perhaps Grantaire could atone for that sin by choosing someone already marked for death. He had only to figure out what that mark might be.

With a groan, he got out of his bed, rubbing his arms briskly to warm himself up, then slipped on his coat.

Of course, he might be wrong. It could be that Enjolras was not attracted to the loss of life but some other aspect of the tragedies Grantaire had witnessed. But as Prouvaire had so wisely suggested, there was little to be lost should Grantaire’s assumption be proven incorrect. He was starting to suspect there wasn’t much he would not be willing to do for Enjolras.

Grantaire stepped out of his building. He’d stayed in bed most of the day and his stomach ached from the meals he’d missed. He ignored it and walked on, turning the corner.

He had a vague idea of where he intended to go. There were some areas of the city that were always dangerous, day or night, and that everyone generally knew to avoid. Even Pontmercy, who Grantaire had learned lived now in the Gorbeau house and was still bravely discovering his independence, knew better than to go to these places. If anyone deserved to die, Grantaire had the best chance of discovering them there.

His hands shook as he tightened his grip on the blade tucked in his sleeve. It was a dull blade, not very sharp, but of all the things he owned, it was the most likely to serve his purposes.

The street got narrower, the shopfronts less well-kept as Grantaire walked. More children scurried about the streets. Grantaire kept his head down and carried on.

“Monsieur,” a woman called as he passed. She’d positioned herself almost directly beneath the streetlamp and leaned against the wall behind her, languidly watching. When he spared her a glance, she gave him an ugly smile. She was missing some of her teeth and looked much older than she sounded. “How about you and me get to know each other?” She hiked her skirt up indecently high and beckoned him forward. It sent a chill down Grantaire’s spine.

“Maybe some other time,” he said.

“What, you’ve got better things to do?” she demanded, in an instant becoming hostile and aggressive. It suited her features better.

Grantaire kept walking, ignored her taunts and jeers, until it occurred to him: It would be a mercy to end her life. Undoubtedly, she had already suffered many horrors, and it was likely her situation would never improve. If he did nothing, she would almost certainly die anyway and sooner rather than later.

Grantaire doubled back.

“Oh,” she said, when she saw him approach. Her demeanor shifted again as she tried again to entice him. “You came back, monsieur. What’s say you and me find a room? Or a nice, private street we can be alone.”

“I know a place,” Grantaire said. His stomach turned, but he took her by the hand and led her to a narrow street he had noticed earlier, a deep, dark recess that the light did not touch. He prodded her, urging her to go ahead of him, and she did fearlessly.

“I come here,” she said. “It’s good. No one comes this way at night. Too dark.” She turned, stepped close and rested her hands against his chest. “What do you want?”

“You,” he murmured. Grantaire pushed forward, crowding into her space until she was pressed against the rough wall to their right. She grumbled quietly, but pulled him closer all the same. “I want –”

“Yes,” she said. “Tell me what you want, monsieur.”

“I want to beg your forgiveness. I am selfish but I should like to think you derive some benefit from my actions.” Grantaire’s words came quickly. He leaned forward, his face very close to hers, and grasped her arm tightly. “You will at last know peace.”

“I –”

“Say it,” Grantaire pleaded. “Forgive me, please.”

She trembled beneath his hand.

“Say it.”

“I forgive you,” she said sharply. “I forgive you.” She tried to slip free, but Grantaire held fast. “Let me go. I’ll scream.”

He palmed his dull knife.

“I mean it,” she said. “I’ll scream.”

Grantaire let go of her arm so that he could cover her mouth. She tried to bite him. He winced, shut his eyes, and blindly pressed the knife forward. It was difficult. The blade wasn’t sharp enough, so he had to put strength behind it. Even then, it only sunk in a few inches. She shuddered, her mouth opening against his hand in a pained moan. When he opened his eyes again, she was clutching at the knife. The incision bled, but it wasn’t deep enough. Grantaire was obliged to remove the knife and do it again—and then again and again.

He lost track of the number of wounds he made, his vision blurring with tears. When at last she sighed and her ragged breathing stopped, he gently placed her on the ground and used the hem of her skirt to wipe the blood from his hands.

He sat back on his heels to examine his handiwork. 

“What have you done?”

It was Enjolras. Grantaire could feel how close he was even before he turned and saw Enjolras standing no more than a few paces behind him.

“Grantaire, why did you do this?”

“For you. I did it for you. I wanted to see you again,” Grantaire said. “The cat was unsuccessful and so I thought I would try my hand at this but,” he turned, heaving. He decided it was fortunate that he’d not eaten after all. He had nothing in his stomach to come back up now. “It seems I don’t have the stomach for this.”

“I told you that I would come to you,” Enjolras said reproachfully. His footsteps were soft as he walked around Grantaire, bending over to examine the woman. He sighed, then turned his attention to Grantaire, kneeling in front of him. He cupped Grantaire’s cheek and Grantaire leaned into the soft, cool touch. “You need not do this. It was not yet her time.”

“I envy her,” Grantaire said. “You will take her away with you and leave me behind.”

“Don’t be foolish.”

“I’m not.”

“Grantaire.” Enjolras pulled back and folded his hands in his lap. Despite the darkness, Grantaire had a vivid impression of the sort of expression on his lovely face. “Listen to me, please. I ought not to tell you this, but you are—the first person to seek me so diligently, not out of a disregard for your own well-being, I think, but from a true desire to see me.”

“It’s true,” Grantaire agreed. “I was entranced when I first saw you and now you haunt my every waking moment. Had I known how to call you forth, I –”

“Your friends are very brave, but what they propose will come at great cost,” Enjolras interrupted.

“Yes,” Grantaire said. “Combeferre—one of our leaders, you know—has impressed upon us the magnitude of the things we have set out to accomplish and the price we may be required to pay. Revolutions don’t come cheap.”

“Listen to me,” Enjolras said again. Grantaire fell silent. “General Lamarque will soon be on his deathbed. It is the sign that your friends have awaited. Violence will come sooner rather than later now and I want you to promise me that you will keep away when it begins.”

Grantaire bristled. He was far from the most devout believer in the ABC’s cause, but he loved his friends dearly. He couldn’t imagine allowing any of them to take up arms and march without him into the bright future they envisioned.

“Swear to me that you will stay away.”

“Ah, angel. You have as little faith in me as they do, I think,” Grantaire said. “I can and will not make you any such promise.”

There was a quiet disturbed only by Grantaire’s breathing.

“I thought you might say that,” Enjolras admitted. He took the bloodied knife from Grantaire and softly patted his hand. “Go. Leave me to my work.”

Grantaire got to his feet and started to walk.

 

***

 

According to Joly, the spread of cholera was now a proper epidemic.

“Of course,” he said, as they settled in for the first ABC meeting in several weeks, “it was already an epidemic, but now it’s properly an epidemic.” He tapped his cane nervously on the floor. Bossuet leaned over and stopped the tapping. Joly hardly seemed to notice. “Grantaire’s prediction was correct. Lamarque has fallen ill. No word yet on whether he is expected to recover.”

“I have Marius keeping an eye on that for me,” Courfeyrac said, terribly pleased with himself for finding a use for Marius, “and, for good measure, I paid a portion of Grantaire’s army of street urchins. They will bring word if Marius is detained.”

He said this lightly, but they all knew that Marius had been missing more often than not for some weeks. Combeferre had taken him aside to privately admonish him and remind him of their duty to the sacred Republic they were fighting to form. Marius had not yet taken Combeferre’s words to heart.

“In the midst of all this suffering and death, you ought to be happy that he has found happiness,” Prouvaire said to the room at large, but it felt very pointedly directed at Grantaire, who shifted uncomfortably in his chair and earnestly set to his drinking. “He very nearly waxed poetic when I asked him about the young lady that has so ensnared him. It was sweet.”

Across the room, Bahorel whispered something into Feuilly’s ear and the pair broke into raucous laughter.

“I don’t want Lamarque to die,” Joly said despondently. He had stopped tapping his cane in favor of toying with a handkerchief. Already, he had complained at length about the cold he was certain he was developing.

“Death is not so bad,” Grantaire said. “An angel comes to collect you and then you go—to a better place, I suppose. That is the usual excuse, is it not? ‘He has gone to a better place.’”

“I thought you believed in nothing!” Bahorel slapped a hand down on his table. “This is unacceptable. You are simply not allowed to alter your character now.”

Grantaire bit his tongue. He didn’t believe in much, but he did believe in his friends. He believed in Enjolras.

From his place by the fire—the easier to dispose of incriminating evidence, should the police descend upon the Musain’s backroom as they had other meeting places that their compatriots favored—Combeferre made a careful study of the reports Feuilly had provided. They detailed dispersion of men and guns across the city. He hummed to himself as he wrote, scribbling coded notes in the margins of Feuilly’s neat writing.

“Our time is running short,” he said at length, sitting back in his chair. He took off his glasses, setting them aside, and sighed, rubbing tiredly at his eyes. “We need more powder, more guns. We need more men too, but I think finding a hidden armory is more likely than finding more men willing to fight with us.”

“I will go back to the law students and see if I can rouse their spirits,” Bahorel said.

“I can ask around. I think I might be able to find more guns,” Feuilly said.

“Hey!”

A gamin had slipped into the room, mostly unnoticed as everyone fell to discussing how best to address their problems. His shoulder-length hair was a messy tangle that he brushed impatiently out of the way. He paced the room, trying to get the attention of the room at large, but no one so much as looked at him.

“I think I know how to get my hands on enough money to fund our endeavors,” Courfeyrac said.

“We are not bribing the police, Courfeyrac,” Combeferre said. “We’ve discussed that.”

“Hey!”

Grantaire took pity on the gamin and stood, his chair scraping back loudly against the floor. That got Prouvaire’s attention, and he had no qualms about prodding Courfeyrac until he turned, irritated, to tell him off. Grantaire sat again.

“Oh!” Courfeyrac ushered the gamin forward. He felt about in his coat pocket and produced a few coins. “There you are. Now, what have you heard?”

“General Lamarque is dead,” the boy said solemnly, puffing his chest out in a fair imitation of Courfeyrac, actually, as he shared his news. “There are all these people hanging around in the street in front of his house, but I saw the doctor go in, so I went through the garden and found the bedroom window. He died, oh… a half-hour ago? I came straight here.”

The door flew open, hitting the wall, and a breathless Marius charged in.

“Lamarque is dead!”

Joly cried.

Marius turned a peculiar shade of red that Grantaire took to mean Marius was embarrassed both by his own outburst and by the effect it had produced in Joly, and went to confer with Courfeyrac.

“Thank you, citizen, for your service,” Combeferre said, and the boy beamed. “You have helped tremendously.” He had the boy sit down with him, and gave him what remained of his dinner. Once the boy was settled, Combeferre rose and went to stand fully in front of the fire, his back to the group as he stared at the dancing flames. “Tomorrow we must act,” he said. “At the funeral.”

There were murmured assents and then, quite suddenly, the still reverence that had descended upon them all broke and the room was a flurry of motion as they began to plan in earnest. Feuilly and Courfeyrac once more began to pour over their reports. Bossuet comforted Joly. Bahorel stretched and fell into a deep discussion with Combeferre about how best to rally their sympathizers. Prouvaire got up and began to feed some of his papers into the fire. Marius had joined the gamin and looked to be in negotiations with the boy.

Grantaire got up and slipped away without much trouble.

It didn’t surprise him that Enjolras’s predictions had come true, but he did worry that his friends were underprepared for the battle they were intending to fight. He had a sinking feeling that they would not survive, not as they were. Given time, perhaps, and more support their plan might succeed but with their current limitations…

He had left his best knife with Enjolras, but he’d had several weeks to purchase another, this time properly sharpened and a far more effective tool than the old, dulled thing he’d carried with him before. He had this new knife with him now as he crept down the street to the building he’d passed on his way to meet Joly and Bossuet and Musichetta some months ago.

A murderer lived there.

Grantaire stood outside a moment, steeling himself, then in and up until he found the correct door. When he tried the handle, it was unlocked and he let himself in.

He had expected bloodstains, but the floor had been scrubbed clean—it was the only clean area in the room, which made it more, rather than less, conspicuous. The woman had been there, Grantaire remembered, and her husband holding her, _it was an accident_. Well, Grantaire thought, accidents were rarely as accidental as they first appeared.

His reverie was interrupted by a gruff, “What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

It was the husband, and he wasn’t thrilled to find an intruder in his home. He stalked unsteadily forward, swerving unsteadily around a chair to get to Grantaire.

Grantaire quietly sank his new knife into the man’s chest. It went in smoothly and the man cried out, clutching at the blade. Grantaire helped him to the floor and covered his mouth to stifle his cries as he waited for that final breath.

“You must stop.”

Grantaire reclaimed his knife, carefully cleaning it on the man’s shirt, and tucked it away out of sight, careful not to nick himself. He still very much hated the sight and scent of blood.

“I told you that I would come for you when it was time.”

“You told me that Lamarque would die and he has,” Grantaire said. He got to his feet and turned to find Enjolras standing very close, within arm’s reach. “Tomorrow we begin our fight for freedom. I wanted to see you before I consigned myself to my fate.”

Enjolras embraced Grantaire so suddenly Grantaire’s breath caught in his throat. Enjolras felt cool, even through the layers of clothes between them. He buried his face in Grantaire’s neck, his fingers stroking through Grantaire’s hair, and Grantaire held onto him tightly, uncertain whether he was giving or receiving comfort.

“You can tell me, angel.”

“No,” Enjolras said, his voice muffled against Grantaire’s skin. “I can’t.” He sighed. “You could leave the city. There are so many places you haven’t seen. You could be happy if you left.”

“Would I see you again?”

“Not for a very long time.”

Grantaire shook his head. “Then I am where I need to be.”

 

***

 

Grantaire adjusted his cap and followed along beside Prouvaire, who had a saber in hand. Grantaire assumed it had come from Prouvaire’s private collection of medieval armaments, but had not taken the time to ask. 

The ABC marched proudly down the street, guns propped against their shoulders and cockades pinned to their waistcoats. The little gamin from their meeting was there tugging at Courfeyrac’s sleeve and begging for a gun of his own. Marius walked alongside an old man, touching Marius’ arm now and then as they made their way down the street.

There were barricades springing up all over; they passed three on their march. At each site, Combeferre halted their procession and spoke with those building the barricades. Once his curiosity was satisfied, he continued to lead them onwards.

“It looks good,” Prouvaire said. “The people are rising up.”

“Any dog will snap if you prod it enough,” Grantaire replied. “The strength of their will shall be determined by those first few bullets.”

All around, there were shouts as people barricaded themselves into their homes and shouted orders at one another.

Before the funeral, and after a lengthy discussion, the ABC had picked the Corinthe as the site for their own barricade, which Grantaire thought was a particularly fortunate choice. The wine would be welcome later when they were either celebrating the birth of their new Republic or mourning its loss.

“Here!” the gamin cried, and he pulled Courfeyrac along, chattering loudly as he directed him, who, in turn, passed along orders to the others.

“Tear up the paving stones!”

Bahorel whooped and clapped and whistled, then dragged Feuilly off.

Grantaire went with Prouvaire into the Corinthe to collect chairs and tables to add to the paving stones. A few of the women complained and tried to shoo them out, but soon gave up and instead devoted their efforts to salvaging what remained of the interior of the shop.

With effort and time, the barricade took shape and continued to grow at a steady pace as members of the ABC and other insurgents broke down stairs, signs, furniture—Grantaire thought he saw the remains of a piano at one end. Absurdly, his heart broke more for the loss of the instrument than it had for any of the lives he had taken. He thought he ought to feel guiltier about that, but he was too tired—physically, mentally, spiritually—to feel true remorse. He ducked into the Musain with Prouvaire and helped carry out additional chairs to add to the barricade.

A small group of National Guardsmen had already tried to come through this area once, but the then-newly erected barricades had prevented them from reclaiming the street. They had left with threats to return with cannons. Bahorel had found this particularly amusing and shouted words of encouragement to the retreating guardsmen: “ _Please_ do. You are making this too easy, friends!”

“He shouldn’t provoke them,” Prouvaire had said reproachfully and Grantaire had shrugged.

“How much worse can it get?”

Earlier at Lamarque’s funeral, when Lafayette had been giving a very touching speech that everyone paused to appreciate, Grantaire had turned his head just in time to see a flash of gold: Enjolras. He had silently rejoiced, rather than taking that as the ill omen it was no doubt meant to be, and then he had forgotten about it in the midst of the riot that had later broken out among the crowd.

He thought of Enjolras now.

Combeferre appeared, Courfeyrac and Feuilly at his side. The gamin trailed after Courfeyrac and looked very pleased with himself.

“Good work. I think this ought to do the trick.”

“We’ve nothing left to do now but wait, I think,” Grantaire said, squinting as he tried to remove a splinter from his thumb. It was just large enough that he could see it and just small enough that he couldn’t get it out. He sucked at his thumb for a moment, easing the gentle, throbbing pain. “Unless you had further plans for how we might use our time.”

“I’m going to send a few people out to see how the other barricades are doing,” Combeferre said. He put a hand on the gamin’s head, and the gamin pulled a face, but quickly straightened up. “Until then, yes. We’ll wait.”

“I’ll go,” Prouvaire said. “I want to stop by my room and pick up a few more things anyway.”

Grantaire watched Prouvaire go off with Combeferre and the gamin.

“If it’s all the same to you, I think I shall retreat to the Corinthe. I have a little money and they have more than a little wine. A good match, wouldn’t you say?”

Courfeyrac clapped Grantaire on the shoulder and laughed. “Don’t drink too much, Grantaire. We’ll need every man at their best.”

Grantaire took the advice in stride and made good on his word, picking his way through those still improving upon the barricade so that he could go back into the Corinthe. Stripped bare of its furniture, it seemed a very different place. One girl had a broom and was busily sweeping the floor. The others had all disappeared upstairs, he assumed.

He went around the bar and found several unopened bottles lined up there.  

“Fortuitous,” Grantaire said. He left his money on the bar and gathered up as many bottles as he could carry without danger of dropping them. He took them outside, hugging them close to his chest, and went in search of a relatively private place to drink in peace. The sun was beginning to set, casting the street in a warm, red glow. Grantaire thought it a hideously obvious foreshadowing and scoffed.

There was a smaller barricade that had been crafted as something of an afterthought. It blocked off a smaller side street. No one was watching it at the moment, and as Grantaire settled down, his back pressed against it, and busied himself with one of his bottles, he thought that he would have to remember to bring that to Combeferre’s attention.

“Can you hear me, Enjolras?” he asked quietly, turning the bottle in his hands. It was good. Certainly worth more than what he had paid for it. “I think you must be able to. You must see us all always. How else would you know when and to whom to appear? But that mystery does not interest me. No, I merely wish to tell you that I think it must not be long now. They are very hopeful, but I think I know how this will end. I think I will see you soon.”

There was no reply. Grantaire had not expected one.

He contented himself with his bottles and hummed quietly to himself, nearly falling asleep despite the discomfort of sitting on the cold ground.

Gunshots and yet more shouting startled him into wakefulness. He sat up.

With a heavy sigh, he climbed to his feet, leaning heavily against the wall as he adjusted to being upright. It had started to rain again, a light sprinkle, he noticed. It was leaving a fine mist on everything, including Grantaire. He wiped at his eyes and, as soon as he was reasonably sure he could walk without stumbling over his own feet, he went to investigate the gunshots.

Several guardsmen had tried to climb the barricade, from what Grantaire could see. They were stopped only by Marius, who held a torch in one hand and—

“That utter fool,” Grantaire muttered.

—a powder keg. He seemed to care little about whether or not the thing caught fire, from the way he waved the flame around, but the guardsmen obviously did, and were carefully backing away. The moment they were gone, Courfeyrac darted forward and snatched the torch from Marius.

“You could’ve killed us all!”

“He saved us,” Feuilly said.

“Help me take the wounded inside,” Joly said, anxiously flitting about and checking on the men that had been shot. Grantaire gladly assisted with that task, unsteady as he was, reasoning that he would either see these men treated under Joly’s watchful eye, or he would see them succumb to their injuries, in which case he would see Enjolras. Both prospects cheered him considerably despite the headache he could feel coming on, a combination of too much wine and an impending storm.

Between the two of them, they carried three men inside. One man had been shot in his thigh and bled over Grantaire’s shoes and trousers. He wrinkled his nose. Blood was difficult to wash out once dried, and the washerwoman would not be pleased to see the stains. He would be obliged to pay extra for the inconvenience.

“Can you fetch Combeferre?” Joly asked. “We should set up our hospital now, before the National Guard return. We’ll need mattresses.”

Grantaire dutifully went back outside.

The gamin was practically dancing, he was so gleeful, and Courfeyrac was lavishing him with praise. A crowd had formed, a few insurgents leaning against the barricade, the rest in a loose circle. Between them, Feuilly, Bossuet, and Bahorel held an older man captive. He had his chin defiantly tipped back, refusing to break Combeferre’s gaze.

“A spy,” Courfeyrac said to Grantaire. “Gavroche was clever enough to recognize him.”

“Ah.”

“Shoot me now, if you dare,” the spy said. “You will not keep this barricade for long. The National Guard will stamp your embers out. No one will join you in the morning. The good, law-abiding citizens of this great city will not risk their lives and livelihoods to support a group of foolish young upstarts.”

Combeferre watched him for a moment, then came to Courfeyrac and Combeferre.

“We should kill him,” Courfeyrac murmured.

“What good is a spy?” Grantaire agreed. “If you keep him alive, he might escape and compromise our efforts.”

“I hate this,” Combeferre said under his breath, but he seemed resolved. “There must be a better way.”

“If you oppose execution, then let it go to trial,” Courfeyrac said, “only, let us do this quickly. We have other matters to which we must attend.” Courfeyrac gave Combeferre his pistol, and Combeferre took it, thoughtfully studying it as he rejoined the group at large. He tucked the pistol into his waistband and sighed.

“Take him and tie him up,” Combeferre directed. “We’ll let the people decide his fate.”

Bossuet went off to find rope and Bahorel and Feuilly took the spy, none too gently, to the Corinthe. Grantaire slipped his hand into his pocket, tracing the outline of his knife. It would be the simplest thing in the world to do what Combeferre had not. For all their talk, Grantaire was beginning to suspect his friends would have a far more difficult time taking lives no matter what the circumstances. At least, he reflected, he had some experience and might prove useful to their cause after all.

“You at the barricades!”

Grantaire exchanged a look with Bahorel, who left Bossuet and Feuilly to finish tying up the spy and brushed against Grantaire’s shoulder as he stepped forward, closer to the barricade.

“What do you want?” Bahorel called.

A pause, then: “We have one of your boys!”

There was Bahorel, just before him, and Feuilly and Bossuet behind him. Marius stood off to the side, and Joly had emerged from the Corinthe, drawn by the shouting. Courfeyrac and Combeferre stood together, heads bowed in conference, but though Grantaire looked, he could not find Prouvaire among the crowd. A cold panic gripped his heart, painfully constricting until he could hardly breathe.

“Bring the spy,” he said urgently, pulling at Bahorel’s arm. “Trade the spy for Jehan. Combeferre! We must make a trade! We—”

“ _Vive la France_!” shouted a strong voice. Prouvaire. Grantaire clutched Bahorel tighter, relying on his strength to stay upright. “Long live France! Long live the future!”

The report rang out. Silence fell.

“They’ve killed him!” cried Joly.

Grantaire felt weak in the knees. Jean Prouvaire, dead. He tasted salt and wiped at his face to find tears streaking down his face, mingling with the rain which was coming down more steadily. He gathered his strength and released Bahorel, carefully picking his way across rain-slicked paving stones. He still had some wine left, he thought, and though it was no doubt being watered down by the rain, something was better than nothing.

He returned to the smaller barricade, his bottles lined up against it where he had left them. He tested each one. Two were empty, one was very nearly empty, and the other three were unopened.

Grantaire tipped his head back and finished the lightest bottle. It was only after he set it down, leaning back against the barricade with a sigh, that he realized he wasn’t alone. There was a body stretched out to his left, along the wall. Without a light, he could not say with certainty who it was; he got to his feet, bottle in hand, and went to explore.

It was a young girl. She was dressed like a boy, in too-big trousers and a loose shirt stained with blood. Her mouth was slack, revealing missing teeth, and she had, even in death, a sort of hard look about her eyes that spoke to a life spent roaming the streets. Yet, despite this, an innocence graced her features, betraying her youth. Grantaire knelt beside her, put his bottle aside, carefully closed her eyes and placed her folded hands on her stomach. He was arranging her hair when he felt a hand on his shoulder.

“Jehan is a remarkable individual. I am proud to know him; few meet me so bravely.”

Grantaire opened his mouth to speak, but his throat was sore and he couldn’t seem to produce a sound. He sat back on his heels, his hands shaking, and felt the tears come again. He turned into Enjolras’s touch, and Enjolras didn’t hesitate to take him in his arms. It hurt still, Prouvaire’s loss, but it was an ache soothed by the fingers gentling pulling through his hair.

“You’ve been drinking again.”

“Yes, well, I think it only fair. I loved him.” Grantaire shuddered. “I knew from the start that their venture was doomed, but I kept quiet. I see now that I should have fought harder to keep them from making their stand here—from making a stand at all, even. What good is a Republic without those citizens who fought so hard to see the ideal realized?”

“I asked you not to come,” Enjolras said.

“You asked me not to die,” Grantaire surmised. “I told you that I could not let them march into victory without me. That is still true.” Reluctantly, he pulled away from Enjolras, though not before pressing a kiss to his pale cheek. “I think I should go. This girl needs you and I—should be with the others.”

He used the wall to climb to his feet and doubled back to his line of bottles, collecting those that were still full. He no longer had a taste for wine, but he had a feeling that his friends might appreciate it.

 

***

 

Grantaire awoke with a start. 

He did not recall falling asleep, but he found himself upstairs in the Corinthe, slumped over one of the few tables remaining to that establishment. They had missed it, he thought, in the chaos of the previous day. He had half a mind to drag it downstairs to throw on the barricade; they had been in talks, just before he retired to the Corinthe, to pad the thing with a mattress, with the idea that the mattress, if placed correctly, would absorb some of the impact of a cannon ball and leave the barricade unharmed.

Grantaire went downstairs.

There was half a dozen more wounded lying on thin mattresses or blankets.

Without scaling the barricade to see for himself, he knew that they were facing too many guardsmen with too many weapons for any of them to stand much of a chance. Already, they were running short on supplies—the gamin (“Gavroche!” Courfeyrac had exclaimed as he made a valiant effort to break free of Bahorel’s grasp and climb the barricade to reach the boy) had been shot attempting to empty the cartridge-boxes of the guardsmen they had managed to fell in the first onslaught.

“The rain ruined a portion of our powder store,” Grantaire heard Bossuet saying gravely to Combeferre.

“Well, then let us stand firm and wait until those reinforcements we were promised arrive come morning,” Grantaire said, rubbing at his eyes. His suggestion was met only with a desperate, sad sort of look from Bossuet.

“Grantaire! Come here.” Bossuet led Grantaire off, away from Combeferre and the barricade and anyone that might overhear them. “I hadn’t the heart to wake you. Rather, I had hoped you would sleep through the conflict and find your way home after it was all over.”

“A kind thought,” Grantaire told him and meant it, though he couldn’t help but loathe himself a little more fiercely than usual. What did it say for his character that his friends continued to think him uncommitted? Even Enjolras had not expected Grantaire to remain at the barricade. It made no difference in the end. Let them doubt his resolve all they liked. Grantaire was as capable of taking a stand as any of them, if not for the sake of revolution, then for the sake of friendship.

“They fired upon us again this morning. Really, I am surprised that failed to rouse you,” Bossuet said. He hesitated, then said miserably, “You saw how our hospital has grown, I’m sure.”

“Yes,” Grantaire said. “Joly will have his hands full.”

“That is—there is more.”

When Bossuet made no effort to continue, Grantaire shifted his weight uneasily, his stomach sinking. He dreaded what Bossuet might have to say, and yet felt compelled to press him for the news, his hands twisting nervously together as he said, “For God’s sake, man, out with it. Please.”

“Bahorel died this morning,” Bossuet said.

“Oh.”

Tears pricked at Grantaire’s eyes and blurred his vision. Bossuet made an aborted motion, as though he had intended to embrace Grantaire and thought better of it. He settled for pressing Grantaire’s hand.

“Grantaire? Are you alright?”

“How did he die?” Grantaire asked dully. A half a dozen gruesome visions flashed before his eyes: Bahorel lying prone, run through with a bayonet; Bahorel, atop the barricade, being toppled by a cannon ball; Bahorel, riddled with grapeshot and coughing up blood. At least Enjolras had taken him. At least Grantaire knew Bahorel was now with Prouvaire and, perhaps, Enjolras, wherever that might be.

“A shot to the chest.” Bossuet wrung his hands. “Joly… He says it was quick.”

Joly had not. Grantaire knew Bossuet well enough to detect the deceit. Another kindness, attempting to shield Grantaire from the full horror of what had occurred.

“Ah, well. Small mercies.” Grantaire offered a vague smile that felt too fragile and strained.

During the night, what time had not been given to self-reflection and prayer had been spent telling stories, sharing little poems and songs, and drinking Grantaire’s wine, until a somber mood had descended over the group. They had not slept for fear of another attack, the likes of which Marius had already averted with his reckless promise to blow up the barricade and all with it. Yet, despite the exhaustion of more than a full day without sleep, and despite the sorrow of losing Prouvaire, his friends still held firm in their convictions and their certainty that they would be joined in the morning by more supporters to their cause.

As Bossuet and Grantaire rejoined Combeferre, Grantaire learned that the people had not risen.

“Those who swore to join us, who pledged their honor to our cause and to this barricade, have not come. They are too afraid,” Combeferre was saying. “Certainly it has not helped, seeing the National Guard marching through the streets.”

Grantaire’s heart sank. He had often speculated that they might find themselves in this situation, but he had hoped that between Combeferre, Courfeyrac, and Feuilly they might fan the growing spark of discontent into a cleansing flame that would burn away oppression and misery to make way for the Republic.

“We should leave,” Grantaire said. “There is still time. We can leave now before they tear down the barricade and arrest us.”

“There are people who observe the rules of honor as one observes the stars, from a great distance.” Combeferre smiled grimly. “I intend to make a stand.”

Grantaire threw his hands up despairingly, and said, “You will _die_.”

But Combeferre had moved to the barricade and was already speaking to the insurgents there, attempting to exhort them to remain true to the oaths they had sworn and the cause for which Prouvaire and Bahorel and already sacrificed their lives. To Grantaire’s horror, it was effective. Rather than throwing down their guns and retreating, as Grantaire still wished they would, all over, there were rallying cries of “ _Vive la France_!” and “Long live the future!”

These were met with mocking cries from the guardsmen and warnings to lay down arms to avoid another assault.

The insurgents began to take position. They had yet another advantage in that the barricade provided excellent cover and gave them some elevation, while the guardsmen had to contend with a flat street. There were many more of them than there were insurgents, however, and already they had replaced those that had been killed in the morning’s assault with fresh soldiers.

And, of course, the insurgents were running out of bullets.

Grantaire stepped in front of Bossuet.

“Bossuet, you cannot mean to stay!”

“You may leave if you like,” Bossuet said, patting Grantaire on the shoulder as he circumvented him, “but my place is here.”

Grantaire swallowed thickly, his hands shaking as he kept pace beside Bossuet, following him to the barricade.

“Go, Grantaire.”

“And what of Musichetta? If you stay and Joly stays—what of her?”

There was the thunderous boom of a cannon and the barricade trembled. It was followed immediately by a round of bullets that obliged Grantaire to take shelter behind the barricade, even as bullets found their way through it.

The insurgents took aim and began to fire back.

For some time, Grantaire was caught in the middle. Without a gun of his own, he had no way of joining the struggle, even if he had been any good at shooting, which he most assuredly was not. He watched, helplessly, as men began to fall around him, the guardsmen drawing closer with every new round. Joly peeked out of the door of the Corinthe from time to time, leaving only to carry the wounded safely inside. These trips became less frequent as the guardsmen drew nearer; the façade of the Corinthe had been partly demolished from grapeshot. One of the windows had been shot out completely and left a large hole in its place.

There was an unsettling quiet as both the insurgents and the Guardsmen again reloaded.

Grantaire took advantage of the opportunity to retreat to the Corinthe.

“Grantaire, thank God!” Joly cried. “I cannot manage here alone. When they stop shooting, I need you to help me go out and fetch anyone who has been too wounded to fight. The dead—they must stay where they are presently, I’m afraid.”

“Is there any hope at all of convincing you to leave?” Grantaire asked. “If not for your own sake, then for your beloved Musichetta?”

“Shush. We haven’t the time for that,” Joly said irritably. “We spoke with her before the funeral, of course, and had to beg her to remain at home until we could determine the outcome of our rebellion.” He held a hand up, tipped his head to one side, listening. “Ah, there. Listen: they are reloading. Come, quickly.”

They hurried outside.

Nearly everyone on the barricades had been wounded. Courfeyrac, positioned very near the flag that Feuilly had triumphantly raised only the day before, had tied a bandage around his arm. It was already soaked through with blood. Combeferre had lost his glasses and had a cut along his brow.

“No, no, no!” Joly sprinted forward, Grantaire only a moment behind as he recognized a familiar form collapsed at the foot of the barricade. Joly fell to his knees, carefully turning Bossuet over and cradling him in his arms. Bossuet had been shot in the shoulder and chest. He groaned, low and painful, when Joly moved him. Joly pressed his hands to Bossuet’s chest in an effort to stem the bleeding. “We have to get you inside!”

“No, I think not,” Bossuet murmured, and he reached up with one shaky, bloodied hand, weakly pulling Joly down so that their faces were very close. He continued to speak, too quietly for Grantaire to make out.

Grantaire turned away to give them the illusion of privacy. A chill ran down his spine and when he looked up it was to see Enjolras standing at the end of the barricade, by someone leaning bodily against the barricade. Grantaire slipped on paving stones slick with blood and rainwater and tried to catch himself on the barricade, hastening to reach Enjolras. Instead he fell, painfully hard, to his hands and knees. By the time he regained his feet, Enjolras was nowhere in sight.

It was Feuilly. He rested against the barricade, his gun still clenched firmly in one hand. He looked to the world as though he had stopped to rest or reload, but his eyes were closed and his chest too still.

Grantaire stumbled backwards. Prouvaire, Bahorel, and Feuilly. Bossuet.

He returned to Joly, who had risen and was checking Courfeyrac’s wound. Bossuet lay on the ground where Joly had found him, draped in Joly’s coat. Grantaire paused a moment, head bowed, and quietly entreated Enjolras to look after Bossuet.

“I will be fine!” Courfeyrac said, gently shaking himself free of Joly’s grasp and thereby ending the impromptu examination. “There are others here who will profit more from your healing touch, Doctor Joly. Be careful.” He pulled Joly into a brief, fierce hug before resuming his place at the top of the barricade.

The guardsmen called out orders to one another as they formed another onslaught. Grantaire dragged Joly back to the Corinthe with him just in time to miss the next round of bullets.

“I should be out there,” Joly said. “I should have been with Bossuet.”

“You ought to be in here with me,” Grantaire said. “Keep down.”

They took shelter beneath the blown-out window, closely huddled together, Joly curling into Grantaire’s side. Grantaire put an arm around him and pretended that he couldn’t hear the shots outside, Combeferre’s voice rising above the din to encourage the insurgents to stand their ground.

“I don’t know what to tell Musichetta,” Joly said. “Bossuet was far better at sharing bad news. He knew the nuances of her moods better than I.”

A final shot rang out. Grantaire cautiously peered through the window frame.

“Courfeyrac has fallen!” he exclaimed and Joly twisted around so that he could see it for himself. “Look, Combeferre is trying to get him down. Let’s bring them both in here.”

“But, Grantaire,” Joly said, “the soldiers are drawing closer and I believe they mean to kill us all. We had better take them somewhere else instead. Only—I don’t know where we _can_ go.”

“We will find a way out of this as soon as we have them in hand,” Grantaire said.

Again, the two of them went out. The gunsmoke was thicker now that the guardsmen were closer. It burned Grantaire’s throat as he hurried to assist Combeferre in getting Courfeyrac down from his place atop the barricade. Though, Grantaire could see as he approached, Courfeyrac was already dead. With increasingly fewer insurgents with which to contend, the guardsmen had begun to approach the barricade after each barrage. Now they were climbing the barricade, bayonets in hand as as they made their final assault.

“Combeferre, we must go!” Joly called. He was faster than Grantaire, reaching the barricade several paces ahead of him, and crawled up enough that he could tug at Combeferre’s leg, attempting to pull him down.

“We cannot leave Courfeyrac!” Combeferre replied.

“Combeferre, please!”

A guardsman appeared at the crest of the barricade, just behind Courfeyrac. He roughly pushed Courfeyrac aside and before he could so much as lift his gun, ran a bayonet into Combeferre’s breast once, then twice, then once more. Combeferre fell backwards to the ground, his head cracking against the paving stones, and Joly followed, quickly sliding down the barricade to check on him.

Again, Enjolras was there, on the periphery of Grantaire’s field of vision, coming for Combeferre and Courfeyrac.

Grantaire took Joly by the hand and they fled to the Corinthe.

“We have nowhere left to go,” Joly gasped between breaths, tears streaming down his face.

The insurgents at the barricade had been killed, and now some guardsmen worked on dismantling the barricade as others continued to climb over and look for any survivors. A small group were coming for Grantaire and Joly, having spotted them through the hole in the Corinthe’s façade.

“Up, up,” Grantaire said. “We will go up!”

The stairs had been hacked to pieces to provide additional support to the barricade, but the steps themselves remained. Grantaire herded Joly up the stairs before him. There were several private rooms, but only one remained open, the door unbarred as though to invite them in. Grantaire turned to point this out to Joly just as a guardsman raised his pistol.

Joly fell against Grantaire, his features contorted in a perfect expression of shock: his eyes wide, his mouth a little surprised _o_. Grantaire sagged beneath this weight, and they both went crashing to the floor.

“Just a little further,” Grantaire murmured, and he struggled to drag Joly with him into the room and shut the door behind them. There was a window up here too, though it was still intact. Grantaire settled Joly there beneath the window so that he might see the sky. In the rest of the city, it was actually a rather lovely day now that the rain had passed and the clouds had dissipated.

“I very much like your friends.”

Grantaire took off his coat and folded it as neatly as he could manage, tucking it beneath Joly’s head so that Joly might have something more comfortable than the hard wooden floor to lay upon. Then he stood and looked out of the window again. Enjolras remained an arm’s length away. Grantaire could feel him there, watching.

“It was always to end this way and you knew.”

Enjolras carefully stepped around Joly so that he could look out of the window with Grantaire. He put his head on Grantaire’s shoulder and sighed, which was answer enough.

“Even before I met you I feared this outcome,” Grantaire admitted. A peace was beginning to settle over him, soothing the anxious turning of his stomach. He rested his head against Enjolras’. “I regret that my friends—” he paused, the words sticking in his throat. He couldn’t look at Joly. “I wish that they had listened to me and given this up, or waited a little while longer to act.”

“It was time,” Enjolras said.

The door swung open. Grantaire hadn’t the energy nor means to bar it, and that meant the guardsmen had no trouble at all in letting themselves in and checking for other insurgents. But there was only Joly, who lay dead on the floor, and Grantaire—and Enjolras, who remained at Grantaire’s side. Their focus was on Grantaire wholly. Though Grantaire felt quite detached from the scene, he wondered at that.

“There is just the one!” said one guardsman. “He is the last.”

“Well, then! This should be easy,” said another. “Take aim!”

An officer halted the proceedings.

“Wait,” he said to his men. Then, to Grantaire, “Do you wish to have a blindfold?”

“No,” Grantaire said.

“Are you with the insurgents?” the officer asked.

“Yes,” Grantaire said. “I’m one of them.”

The order came again for the guardsmen to take aim, and the officer stepped back as they lifted their guns. Grantaire’s breath quickened and he began to tremble.

“Long live the Republic!” he cried with a strength that he himself did not expect.

“Do you permit it?” Enjolras asked as he pressed Grantaire’s hand. He seemed to glow, illuminated by the light of the sun behind him. His skin was warm against Grantaire’s, his smile inviting and kind. Grantaire leaned forward for a gentle kiss.

The report resounded.

 


End file.
